China's machine tool consumption is now growing strongly German manufacturers have returned to China

China Industry Daily Meng Fanjun

Although the Chinese market was previously hit hard by the new pneumonia epidemic, it has recovered rapidly. It is estimated that China's industrial production and capital investment will increase by more than 5% respectively in 2021, and machine tool consumption may achieve a strong growth of 10%. "Germany is the second largest supplier in China's machine tool industry, second only to Japan, and has a position in the high-tech field. Its technology is widely used in various customer fields in China, such as automotive, aerospace, mechanical engineering, power generation and other machine tool users with a wide base." At the 17th China International Machine Tool Exhibition (CIMT2021), Shane Sun from Germany Machine Tool Manufacturers Association (VDW) in Frankfurt, China explained.

On April 12, at the press conference of CIMT2021 of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association, Wilfried Sch, Managing Director of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association (VDW) in Frankfurt? Dr fer said: "due to the impact of the new crown epidemic, the exit is limited. german manufacturers will be mainly represented by their subsidiaries in china.".

"Finally, we ushered in a real trade exhibition again." Exhibitors and visitors gathered at the booth for face-to-face discussion, which is exactly what many German machine tool manufacturers are looking forward to CIMT2021.

CIMT is a new starting point for umati to enter China

From 2020, the orders of German machine tools from China began to stabilize, and even increased by 17% in the fourth quarter, reaching a double-digit growth rate. In 2021, there are many signs that the global economy will continue to grow. Wilfried Sch? Fer judged: "The development in 2021 will be more encouraging, because we should have already ushered in a turnaround."

China Industry News found that VDW has a umati booth in CIMT. It is reported that umati (Universal Mechanical Technology Interface) is a community of mechanical engineering industry and its customers, which is used to promote and disseminate open standardized interfaces based on OPC UA. The purpose of CIMT demonstration is to introduce the interface specification of machine tool and higher level IT system communication to the Chinese industry, and show the convenience of its work. Six companies (also exhibitors of the German Pavilion) have connected their machines. "Unfortunately, the consequences of the new coronal epidemic prevented more companies from joining our activities." Dr. Alexander Broos, director of research and technology at VDW and responsible for OPC UA's activities in the machine tool industry, expressed regret.

In order to make umati fully enter china, the advanced manufacturing technology center (amtc) of tongji university is providing support for its technical infrastructure in beijing. "We are also very happy to connect machines and services with China's machine tool interconnection initiative NC Link, which is a continuation of the successful cooperation on EMO Hanover in 2019." Alexander Broos said.

At that time, a number of Chinese CNC machine tool manufacturers had established contact with umati. Alexander Broos said that now the NC Link team has realized the connection between the OPC UA infrastructure and its own installation. The core element of Umati's participation in CIMT is the umati demonstrator, which consists of a data center connected to the computer in real time and a special dashboard.

German machine tool supplier is an important partner of Chinese industry

For many years, the German machine tool industry has been a valuable partner of Chinese industrial customers, thus China has become the sales market of the German machine tool industry. In the past two years, Germany's export volume has decreased by nearly 45%, from 2.3 billion euros to 1.3 billion euros. The main products involved are machining centers, grinders, parts, lathes, etc. In contrast, China's imports have not suffered such a heavy blow. In 2020, they only declined by 28%. Most of the imported products delivered are parts and accessories. Wilfried Sch? Fer believes that there is still a huge demand for modern production technology in china, especially because the next step for chinese industry is to launch higher quality products that can also meet the needs of the global market.

Wilfried Sch? Fer concluded that: china international machine tool exhibition is a very good exhibition platform. on this platform, chinese customers will trust and choose the products displayed by german manufacturers. china international machine tool exhibition will make more contributions to promoting the development of bilateral business.

In fact, the same is true of the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association. For many years, the German Machine Tool Manufacturers Association has been applying to the German Federal Ministry of Economy and Technology for the establishment of a German joint booth at the China International Machine Tool Exhibition, and is responsible for the implementation of the project. At present, Germany has become an overseas participant in the 17th China International Machine Tool Exhibition (CIMT 2021). There are 150 companies exhibiting various machine tools, cutting tools, clamping technologies, measuring technologies, molds, and CNC systems and software, with a total exhibition area of 7500 square meters.

"Attending the exhibition is a good opportunity for us to gain popularity and experience abroad." Alexander Broos concluded, "We hope this will happen again in other markets soon."